Attrition-hit offices get impatent

NEW DELHI: A wave of attrition has hit the country's patent offices with over one-fifth of the patent examiners leaving the job for better prospects in the past two years.

Meanwhile, with vacant jobs not being filled immediately, the backlog of patent applications is set to increase. Currently, the patent office begins examination of an application nearly two years after a request to that effect is made by the applicant.

Over 35 patent examiners have quit in the past two years to join patent departments of big corporate houses and law firms. Twenty seven -year-old Ashutosh Bhargava, a biotech postgraduate, was one of the earliest among the patent officials to have spotted this opportunity. He quit in 2005 to join Torrent Pharma after spending just a year at the Delhi patent office. Now, he is with biotech firm Biocon and in the past two years his salary has almost trebled.

"A stint with patent office offers you a unique advantage of acquiring techno-legal knowledge. Most of us either have a legal background or are an expert in certain technical field. But at a patent office you get to learn both aspects making yourself an attractive hunt for the pharma companies or patent attorneys," says Mr Bhargava.

A patent examiner's job is to study the patent application and see whether a patent passes the test of novelty and industrial application. The patent examiner submits his report to the controller general of patents, who based on the report grants or rejects the patent application

Besides knowledge, a patent examiner is also aware of the intricacies of the patent award system and the mindset of the patent officials, which makes him a definite asset for the hiring firm, says a senior patent official, who didn't want to be named.

It's mainly the young examiners, in the age group of 25-35 years, who are quitting the job. And money seems to be the sole motivating factor. "Examining a patent is any day more challenging than drafting a patent application, but money is what counts," says Mr Bhargava.

Patent offices have a sanctioned strength of 195 examiners, of which 65 places are currently vacant. Government was unable to fill 30 vacant seats for lack of suitable candidates, when it held the recruitment two years ago. Another 35 examiners left in the past two years.

Examiners, who are at least post graduate in science, begin with a salary scale of a university lecturer. But stagnate for years before becoming eligible for a higher scale.

Government feels growing opportunity in the field has made it difficult to hold back talent. An official, however says, "We are aware of the constraints at the patent office and looking at ways to make the job monetarily more attractive for examiners." A senior patent official says government should ideally double the sanctioned strength of examiners and have a mechanism to hire at short notice so as to keep applications' backlog from rising.